Rough roads ahead

Next section of Post Road repaving to start next week

Those driving Post Road may have noticed consistent work on the road’s sidewalks, and crews thinning parts of the road to one lane as they work in the road itself.

Those crews are largely here to stay throughout the summer- with full-scale paving set to begin this week.

“Milling and paving work on Post Road, from Elmwood Avenue to Coronado Road, is expected to begin next week and conclude in September,” RIDOT Chief Public Affairs Officer Charles St. Martin said in an email sent last week. “RIDOT also will continue to finalize any sidewalk, ADA-accessibility and adjustment of drainage structures over the summer.”

While Post Road paving started last year, with the northern part of the road paved through Elmwood Ave., this year’s projects will bring new pavement down to the intersection of Main Avenue and the Greenwood Bridge.

Post Road itself will be paved in two sections this year. In addition to the aforementioned Elmwood Avenue to Coronado Road section, repaving from Coronado Road to the Greenwood Bridge will take place over the fall and is expected to be completed in November, according to Heidi Gudmundson, RIDOT’s Programming Services Officer.

The northern section of Post Road, according to Gudmundson, is being completed as one of the final parts of RIDOT’s Airport Connector project. The second half of this year’s Post Road paving is part of $102 million of repaving work committed to state roads in Warwick by the Rhode Island Department of Transportation (RIDOT), far and away the most of any community in the state.

Other planned Warwick repaving projects as part of that project include a stretch of Bald Hill Road from East Ave. to I- 295, West Shore Road from Long Street to Oakland Beach Ave., East Ave. from Bald Hill Road to Main Ave. and the entirety of Main Ave. Replacements of the bridges carrying East Ave. over I-95 and I-295 are scheduled as well.

While those projects were initially scheduled for 2024, according to RIDOT’s website, Gudmundson said some of those projects now have later completion dates. The two bridges are expected to be replaced in the fall of 2025, with Bald Hill Road paving scheduled for that fall as well. Paving of West Shore Road, meanwhile, is expected to be finished in 2026, and Main Avenue is now scheduled for 2027.

The city is also preparing for the biggest repaving project in its history, with the entirety of Jefferson Boulevard expected to be repaved this summer. The city is also planning on repaving Kilvert Street.

The fate of one other local RIDOT project, though, is still up in the air.

RIDOT announced a preliminary design and environmental study to determine necessary infrastructure to allow Amtrak trains to stop at the T.F. Green train station, which currently is only a stop on the MBTA’s Commuter Rail. RIDOT finished the study in December 2023, sending it to Amtrak- the first of two stops it would need to take before potential RIDOT approval.

RIDOT estimates that expanding the station for Amtrak use would likely cost about $240 million.

“The study [looks] at potential costs, benefits and impacts of constructing new electrified track, associated electrified interlockings/switches, a new second fully-accessible station platform, and upgrades to the existing platform to accommodate potential Amtrak intercity service in both directions,” RIDOT’s website states on the project.

Amtrak, according to St. Martin, is still reviewing RIDOT’s study. Should Amtrak approve the study, the study would also need approval from the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) in order to be able to move forward, should RIDOT still wish to do that.

The design will not be made available for the public to see until after it has been processed, approved and potentially tweaked by Amtrak and the FRA, according to St. Martin.

Should the station be fitted for Amtrak service, it would become the third station along the Acela corridor to connect the Northeast Regional route- the most-traveled train route in the U.S.- to an international airport, joining the Newark Airport Railroad Station and Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Train Station.